Pizza by the slice at 2:45 a.m.

The old drunkard’s adage is that pizza — anything edible, really — tastes better when drunk than if you were ice-water-soaked sober. You’ve heard of “beer goggles”? In this case, “beer taste buds,” or “beer buds.” (Please credit me with any future reference to “beer buds,” although it may already exist.)

Pizzarita’s, on Crockett Street between Navarro and St. Mary’s streets, is now serving pizza by the slice until 3 a.m. Friday and Saturday nights. And while two previous experiences at Pizzarita’s (while completely sober) left me unimpressed, I have to say, calculating the level of drunkenness (I do remember the whole thing) with the level of hungriness and the verdict is that the pizza was pretty good. There is probably some psychological stuff going on. Mainly, you’re only paying $3 per slice (bottled drinks are $2) versus more for the whole sit-down restaurant experience. On the street, at 2:45 in the morning, when the pizza’s plopped on a paper plate, expectations are lowered.

Anyway, late-night pizza exists here. I wanted to tell you that, because I think it’s awesome. And there may be a resurgence of late-night eating options, but it’s too early to declaim that. First, let’s see if it sticks. But for example, Meat Market Barbecue recently started staying open later on the weekends (see next post). The bacon-wrapped-hot-dog guys have been working the parking lot at Commerce and Navarro for months, but sadly, they haven’t been spotted lately. They were located right around the corner from Pizzarita’s, an actual tenant of the building, and now that I think of it … crap, they may have replaced the hot dog guys. Anyway, there’s also been sightings of a mobile truck selling chicken and other fowl-related items.

Bottom line: I’m glad Pizzarita’s is doing this. It didn’t register when they opened a little more than a year ago that this could be an option, but this makes so much sense. They’re about as centrally located as you can be. And instead of opening the restaurant, they have a whole setup outside with a table for taking orders and some kind of fancy pizza-warming machine behind it and two tables flanking the setup. At about 2:20 a.m., I came out of neighboring SoHo, looked over, and saw what I can only describe as a scene from “Walking Dead.” Insatiable Zombie-like figures swarming the pizza table. OK, it wasn’t that bad. But it was still beautiful to watch.